Comments and Questions

Definite Articles

singular

plural

masculine

el

los

feminine

la

las

Form

In Spanish, few nouns can stand alone. Most need to be introduced or determined by an article. As in English, an article is characterized as either definite (the) or indefinite (a, an). Spanish articles must match the gender and the number of the noun they determine, resulting in four forms of the definite article, as seen in the table above.

Contractions deland al

The masculine singular definite article elis abbreviated when used with the preposition de of and a to.

Masculine Article with A-initial Feminine Nouns

When a feminine singular noun begins with a stressed a- or ha-, the masculine article unorel is used instead the feminine unaor la, for ease of pronunciation and to maintain a separation between the two words. When the same noun is plural, the feminine article unas or lasis used. The following feminine nouns use the masculine article when singular.

el alma – las almassoul

el hacha – las hachas ax

el hambre – las hambres hunger

el agua – las aguas water

el águila – las águilas eagle

Uses

Spanish uses the definite article in many places where English does. However, some uses of the definite article in Spanish can be tricky for English speakers because the English equivalent does not use the, but rather just a bare noun (a noun with no determiner). Below are the uses of the definite article in Spanish, including both those similar to and different than English.

To Identify a Specific Noun

As in English, the definite article is used to identify a specific noun or to refer to a noun that has already been specified.